Azure • Compute • 10 Min Read

Deploying Linux VMs: CLI vs Terraform

Automating Virtual Machine creation with SSH keys and network security groups.

1

Quick Deploy via CLI

One command to spin up a Linux VM with automatic SSH key generation.

az vm create \
  --resource-group RG-Network-Dev \
  --name WebServer01 \
  --image Ubuntu2204 \
  --admin-username azureuser \
  --generate-ssh-keys
2

Infrastructure as Code (Terraform)

Defining the NIC, Public IP, and VM resource for consistent deployments.

resource "azurerm_linux_virtual_machine" "vm" {
  name                = "devd-vm-prod"
  resource_group_name = azurerm_resource_group.main.name
  location            = "East US"
  size                = "Standard_B1s"
  admin_username      = "adminuser"
  network_interface_ids = [azurerm_network_interface.nic.id]

  os_disk {
    caching              = "ReadWrite"
    storage_account_type = "Standard_LRS"
  }

  source_image_reference {
    publisher = "Canonical"
    offer     = "UbuntuServer"
    sku       = "18.04-LTS"
    version   = "latest"
  }
}